New Featuring: All I Can Do by Albert Christian

This is essentially just a short notice to fellow readers about new link which will be added within couple of days. The new link will feature a blog which is written by my fellow colleague at Swiss German University, Albert Christian. The web page itself will contain articles related to Mechatronics and Robotics, a very specific topic for which the author shows a massive interest and consistently explores in-depth knowledge about technology development. Having worked as an intern in Germany which is well-known for its rapid development in engineering, he also boasts an extensive practical experience supported with theoretical background obtained from the university where he is currently studying. Being dubbed as one of the top students in his batch and entitled a reputable position as the president of SGU Robotic Club, he is without doubt will produce a qualified articles in his specialties.

Premier on his birthday, the web page is anticipated to be the place for those who are interested in the discussion and knowledge sharing related to engineering. Until then, enjoy!

Men's Grooming

This week while I was cleaning out some files from my hard drive, I found a note which was written half-way, mixed with some writing materials and other postings. The note itself was written some time around July and was prepped for the following month's issue. However, it appeared that there were some issues need to be dealt by then, in such way that the intention of continuing this note completely slipped over my mind. But for the time being, this note is ready to be published after some updates and content editorials. Quite surprisingly, it was not because the topic was not interesting at all or whatsoever which led me forget of continuing it. Instead, it related closely to how people reacted towards me recently, especially in regards with outer appearance. Speaking of which, hair coloring or hair highlight or hair painting or whatever those flamboyant fashionistas want to address what I have done to my hair, which is simply put some vaguely conspicuous shades of magenta red into it. As far as I am concerned, I have had my hair cut with almost exactly the same style over the years and rarely went to a hairdressing saloon for any special hair treatments unless for special occassions. Moreover, I am not necessarily a fashion conscious person. And so, when some of my buddies noticed their old-fashioned and nerdy-looking classmate entering the lecture room with hair looks no other like the hair of some members of a youthful yet cheesy Korean boy band, they were like unrestrained and probably thought that the sun had risen from the west! The thing is, it is generally agreed that men have started to pay attention to their appearance, which makes it worth to be discussed further.

Still very fresh in my mind although it had been quite a while after leaving Germany, that my friend started an on line messaging and he asked me about where he could get the cheapest hair cut around my region. I told him that there was a decent barber shop which gave a men hair cut for only 10 Euro, a price which so far I could tell was the cheapest hair cut in town. Then we started to talk about how often we, as men, go to a saloon to get our hair cut or whether we keep ourselves updated with a certain hair style. The brief conversation then led to a short discussion about the importance of men's grooming and whether it is quite relevant these days. But after quite some time, we plunged into a terrible mishap of disagreeing with each other's opinion. I eventually settled a ballistic argument with him mainly about how a man should maintain his appearance. In essence, we discussed about hair cut, clothing, shoes, etc and this hubbub of fashionable haunt related to men’s grooming have somehow turned into a pointless fuss which eventually disturbed me a little bit, mainly because there is nothing wrong for a man to maintain his look. Instead, it is something else which makes men's grooming seems like everything in the world and I refer it as advertisement strategy which was invented by some despicable marketing people.

"Men should only put on what makes them feel comfortable and confident."

Unlike in the olden days where the range of health care or other self maintaining products for men produced by each brand were quite limited. Now though, I can easily be baffled by the sheer number of product ranges launched by only one single company. Since I have mentioned about hair above, I would stick on this topic if I may and take hair maintenance as an example. I believe that shampoo is simply no other than a soapy liquid used to wash your hair, the companies back in Winston Churchill's era might only have very comprehensible product ranges either for men, women or children and that’s it. However, things have changed a little bit over the decades and shampoo has turned into a massive business field. Mind you, I can tell by how specific each manufacturer aims their product to its male customer, there are shampoos for various hair conditions: normal, dry, greasy, dandruff, breakage, etc; and that still hasn’t been included with a massive range of hair conditioners, hair dye products, hair moisturizers, hair spray, hair styling gel which even come with an even more confusing options of whether you want it with lavender scent, aloe vera or maybe any pungent smell from some plants in an isolated botanical garden in Kenya. What are they actually thinking of? Since I don't think that men is a such blithering complicated creature and these products have seemingly turned out to be a rip off disguised in consumer oriented principals.

Obviously and as I have pointed out frequently to my friends, that style is a subjective matter and they are completely in control of exploring the options how they want to look like. What I find essential is, men should only put on what makes them feel comfortable and confident, do some reasonable experiments about how they could look at their best and stick onto it. Presence, charisma, simplicity and decency are what I regard as positive in terms of men's grooming. Unfortunately, some companies look this as an opportunity to sell their product as much as possible by claiming that their products are what men actually need to look good. In my defense, what these companies are exploring is the act of consumerism and they aim it directly at those who feel in need of staying at the front line in terms of style or fashion. Because if logical thoughts are applied, I absolutely see no point at all of buying shoes worth thousands of dollars, while acknowledging that there are people who have no feet at all. To sum up then, men's grooming is entirely relevant these days, but we also should select the proper style that suits us well and not be victimized by the act of marketing and consumerism. Until the next posting, enjoy!